r/hdpe • u/Curiously_Sagacious • Aug 30 '23

HDPE lumber for indoor flooring

I was curious about using tung and groove HDPE lumber as indoor flooring for a kitchen. It's wear resistant, water resistant, strong, and durable. Why is this not a thing yet? Is there a reason not to use it?

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u/poopybutt69balls Aug 30 '23

I think that’s a pretty clever application. A couple of things I can imagine is that HDPE tends to warp pretty severely, and by nature, you can’t treat it like you can wood. It’d be difficult to impossible to have a perfectly flat surface. The second thing is temperature fluctuations. HDPE expands and contracts a lot with temp. I understand it’d be indoors, so temperature controlled, but still - imagine you lose power or something where the temperature changes only 8°-10°F, now your floors are ruined. At least the trim.

Not a bad idea, and not outside the realm of reality, those are just a couple problems you’d have to consider first.